In this paper, T. M. Murray defends a vision of liberal tolerance as grounding the common good. She critiques the discourse that Western liberalism amounts to ‘Islamophobia’ or ‘cultural imperialism’. She argues that liberal academics, in maintaining these narratives, contradict their own vaunted values and tacitly collude with religious hypocrisy and intolerance. She argues for a universal vision of the common good broadly grounded in human flourishing and human nature and linked to the philosophies of Aristotle and J. S. (...) Mill. (shrink)

In a recent case in Great Britain, a couple described as “white” underwent in vitro fertilisation and gave birth to twins described as “black”. In the sense of a fair adjudication of this particular case, serving justice requires a thick description and a sensitive understanding of the relevant facts. We have only a few facts, but they may be sufficient to serve justice in this first sense.We are told that the couple wants to keep the twins. We are told further (...) that British law holds that the woman giving birth is to be regarded as the legal mother . Finally, we are told that DNA testing has established that the gestational mother is also the genetic mother of these infants. Her husband, whose sperm were supposed to be used to fertilise his wife’s eggs, is not the genetic father. A black couple was also undergoing IVF at the same clinic; it may be that this man’s sperm were used by mistake.We know enough to reach a defensible decision in the case. The couple caring for these children has contributed a half share of the children’s genes, and the woman was also the gestational mother, so they have at least an equal argument from biology. Their intention was to have these children and they also wish to raise them; they went through the rigours of IVF, and are willing to take on the responsibility of parenthood. Since the children were born, furthermore, they have shouldered the hard work of parenthood. We don’t know their particular circumstances; perhaps they’ve had help from family or others; but in all likelihood they’ve had an ample share of sleep deprived nights, soiled nappies, and exhausted days. …. (shrink)

Consistent with Ruchkin and colleagues' proceduralist account, recent research on grouping and verbal-spatial binding in immediate memory shows continuity across short- and long-term retention, and activation of classes of information extending beyond those typically allowed in modular models. However, Ruchkin et al.'s account lacks well-specified mechanisms for the retention of serial order, binding, and the control of activation through attention.

Insulin is a member of a family of hormones, growth factors and neuropeptides which are found in both vertebrates and invertebrates. A common ‘insulin fold’ is probably adopted by all family members. Although the specificities of receptor binding are different, there is possibility of co‐evolution of polypeptides and their receptors.

BackgroundUse of modified texture diets—thickening of liquids and modifying the texture of foods—in the hope of preventing aspiration, pneumonia and choking, has become central to the current management of dysphagia. The effectiveness of this intervention has been questioned. We examine requirements for a valid informed consent process for this approach and whether the need for informed consent for this treatment is always understood or applied by practitioners.Main textValid informed consent requires provision of accurate and balanced information, and that agreement is (...) given freely by someone who knows they have a choice. Current evidence, including surveys of practitioners and patients in different settings, suggests that practice in this area is often inadequate. This may be due to patients’ communication difficulties but also poor communication—and no real attempt to obtain consent—by practitioners before people are ‘put on’ modified texture diets. Even where discussion occurs, recommendations may be influenced by professional misconceptions about the efficacy of this treatment, which in turn may poison the well for the informed consent process. Patients cannot make appropriate decisions for themselves if the information provided is flawed and unbalanced. The voluntariness of patients’ decisions is also questionable if they are told ‘you must’, when ‘you might consider’ is more appropriate. Where the decision-making capacity of patients is in question, inappropriate judgements and recommendations may be made by substitute decision makers and courts unless based on accurate information.ConclusionResearch is required to examine the informed consent processes in different settings, but there is ample reason to suggest that current practice in this area is suboptimal. Staff need to reflect on their current practice regarding use of modified texture diets with an awareness of the current evidence and through the ‘lens’ of informed consent. Education is required for staff to clarify the importance of, and requirements for, valid informed consent and for decision making that reflects people’s preferences and values. (shrink)

Within philosophy of action, there are three broad views about what, in addition to beliefs, answer the question of “what to do?” and so determine an agent’s motivation: desires, judgments about values/reasons, or states of the will, such as intentions. We argue that recent work in decision theory vindicates the volitionalist. “What to do?” isn’t settled by “what do I value” or “what reasons are there?” Rational motivation further requires determining how to trade off the possibility of a good outcome (...) against the possibility of a bad one—i.e., determining how much of a risk to take. The risk attitudes that embody this tradeoff seem best understood as intentions: as self-governing policies to weight desires or reasons in certain ways. That we need to settle our risk attitudes before making most decisions corroborates Bratman’s claim that self-governing policies are required for resolving impasses of evaluative and normative underdetermination. Moreover, far from being rare or confined to tie-breakings, cases that are underdetermined but for one’s risk attitudes are typical of everyday decision-making. The will is required for most rational action. (shrink)

Virtue ethics prescribes cultivating global and behaviorally efficacious character traits, but John Doris and others argue that situationist social psychology shows this to be infeasible. Here, I show how certain versions of virtue ethics that ‘go mental’ can withstand this challenge as well as Doris’ further objections. The defense turns on an account of which psychological materials constitute character traits and which the situationist research shows to be problematically variable. Many situationist results may be driven by impulsive akrasia produced by (...) low-level , emotionally induced ignorance about one’s situation, and some may be driven by a further subtype: modal akrasia. Many subjects in the infamous Milgram experiments, e.g., seem to have recognized what the virtuous thing to do was and that they should do it, and only failed to do it because their emotions prevented them from seeing that they could. If the primary constituents of character traits are higher-level mental dispositions involved in deliberation, though, then the results don’t show that these psychological materials are problematically variable. (shrink)

Many people have an aptitude for religious experience and spirituality but don't know how to develop this or take it further. Modern societies offer little assistance, and traditional religions are overly preoccupied with their own organizational survival. Minding the Self: Jungian meditations on contemporary spirituality offers suggestions for individual spiritual development in our modern and post-modern times. Here, Murray Stein argues that C.G. Jung and depth psychology provide guidance and the foundation for a new kind of modern spirituality.Murray (...) Stein explores the problem of spirituality within the cultural context of modernity and offers a way forward without relapsing into traditional or mythological modes of consciousness. Chapters work towards finding the proper vessel for contemporary spirituality and dealing with the ethical issues that crop up along the way. Stein shows how it is an individual path but not an isolationist one, often using many resources borrowed from a variety of religious traditions: it is a way of symbol, dream and experiences of the numinous with hints of transcendence as these come into personal awareness. Minding the Self: Jungian meditations on contemporary spirituality uses research from a wide variety of fields, such as dream-work and the neuroscience of the sleeping brain, clinical experience in Jungian psychoanalysis, anthropology, ethics, Zen Buddhism, Jung's writings and the recently published Red Book. It will be of interest to psychoanalysts, Jungian scholars, undergraduates, graduate and post-graduate students and anyone with an interest in modern spirituality. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Rhetoric 34.4 (2001) 355-363 [Access article in PDF] Plato on Power, Moral Responsibility and the Alleged Neutrality of Gorgias' Art of Rhetoric (Gorgias 456c-457b) James Stuart Murray 1. Introduction You are sitting in your office on a quiet Thursday afternoon when an agitated university administrator enters with news that the students in your "Plato class" have just been interviewed on the city's largest radio station. According (...) to them, their professor claimed that the demise of their university is a direct result of the fact that senior administrative positions are held by a motley assortment of business-oriented, academically cynical, "renewal"-promoting "innovators" whose main preoccupation is "government funding opportunities" in areas of dubious academic importance.Your response might be: "That's not what I taught them." Or perhaps you might say, "That's not exactly what I taught them--I didn't say it was a 'motley' assortment." In either case, you would be relying on some form of what Robert Wardy (170, n.r 20) has dubbed the "blame students, not teachers defence." He asserts, perhaps correctly, that this defense gained the status of topos within the ancient rhetorical tradition. A version of it certainly does seem to show up in Isocrates' Antidosis (250-52) and perhaps in his Nicocles (3-4), and it is suggested by remarks in both Aristotle's Rhetoric (1355b) and Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria (II,16,5). On this occasion, however, I am concerned with only one rendition, probably its earliest extant instance in Greek literature. In Plato's Gorgias, the eponymous sophist argues as follows: Imagine someone who after attending wrestling school, 1 getting his body into good shape and becoming a boxer, went on to strike his father and mother or any other family member or friend. By Zeus, that's no reason to hate physical trainers... and to exile them from their cities! For while these people imparted their skills to be used justly against enemies and wrongdoers, and in [End Page 355] defense, not aggression, their pupils pervert their strength and skill and misuse them. So it's not their teachers who are wicked, nor is this a reason why the craft should be a cause of wickedness; the ones who misuse it are supposedly the wicked ones. And the same is true for oratory as well. The orator has the ability to speak against everyone on every subject, so as in gatherings to be more persuasive, in short, about anything he likes, but the fact that he has the ability to rob doctors or other craftsmen of their reputations doesn't give him any more of a reason to do it. He should use oratory justly, as he would any competitive skill. And I suppose that if a person who has become an orator goes on with this ability and this craft to commit wrongdoing, we shouldn't hate his teacher and exile him from our cities. For while the teacher imparted it to be used justly, the pupil is making the opposite use of it. So it's the misuser whom it's just to hate and exile or put to death, not the teacher. (Gorgias 456d, 457a-b) 2Change "exile from our cities" to "fire from our universities" and this makes a good passage to remember when confronted by that agitated administrator mentioned above. Blame the students, not the teachers.Not much comment has been provoked by this defense of Gorgianic rhetoric and its underlying rhetor/boxer analogy, except over the question of whether we should read the passage as an accurate reflection of the words of the historical Gorgias or as a Platonic invention. In a previous generation, E. R. Dodds (212) reckoned that this defense was "probably the standpoint of the historical Gorgias," while E. A. Havelock (195) cautioned that "there is little--very little--that he [i.e., Plato] lets Gorgias say in the Gorgias." In our own day, and on a more general level, Thomas Cole (151) states that "Plato's... (shrink)

This paper proceeds in two parts. In the first part, I set out Fodor’s concerns about abduction in his recent books, The Mind Doesn’t Work That Way and In Critical Condition. In the second part, I attempt to meet these concerns by suggesting how - within the framework of the Massive Modularity Hypothesis - abduction functions, specifically in the context of means-end reasoning to connect Input Modules and Output Modules. My suggestion will be that natural selection is the Mother of (...) Abductive Inference and that it is evidenced in all sorts of sub-doxastic Means-End Reasoning contexts and for a variety of species. I will eventually discuss two representative cases to illustrate this suggestion: namely, dead reckoning and spatial reorientation. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Liberalism, Art, and FundingDale Francis MurrayLiberalism, Art, and FundingSince Ronald Dworkin published A Matter of Principle, a host of critics have attempted to systematically dismantle his arguments advocating state support for the arts that appear in a chapter entitled, "Can a Liberal State Support Art?"1 The combined critical force of Noël Carroll, Samuel Black, and most recently, Harry Brighouse, has dislodged the main supports of Dworkin's position on this (...) subject.2 However, while I am skeptical that the arguments of liberals who endorse state support for the arts can be fully resurrected, I reckon that a few remarks can be presented to try to deflect at least a fraction of the contentions cast on Dworkin's argument by the critics listed above. In order to refine our understanding of precisely why state support for cultural expression should or should not be permitted, it is imperative that some sort of response to the critics of state support for the arts is offered.In this essay, I focus primarily on Brighouse's objections that Dworkin's arguments supporting arts funding fail primarily because they are not sensitive enough to the ways in which such support violates two demands of justice in a liberal state — state neutrality and publicity. I examine these two objections since they seem to be the most interesting, compelling, and damaging to Dworkin's case if substantiated. If Brighouse is correct, these violations act as heavy bulwarks against state support for arts funding, especially since public distrust of the state's intent (and the state's perceived advocacy of notions of the good with which the public disagrees) is high. I will employ Brighouse's neutrality of intent constraint, because it best represents the alleged specific violations of state neutrality that may undermine Dworkin's case. Additionally, neutrality of intent is the most plausible form of neutrality for advocates of public arts funding to build a case for in the space of a short essay.I also wish to make a distinction, which for the most part, is ignored by Dworkin's critics — that there is a degree to which moral value and aesthetic value are different and that this effects a possible alternative reading of the term "ways of life" as most liberals understand it. As a final note of preface, I will assume that the background conditions of income and wealth are just.3 This proviso will become important when we examine the role of the market in funding arts projects in lieu of the government. Now let us reiterate the two requirements of any just liberal state that are at issue when considering the legitimacy of state support for the arts. [End Page 116]Brighouse sets the pair of constraints on any just liberal state (neutrality and publicity) as the centerpieces of his essay. Neutrality of intent, that he appeals to more specifically, can be understood to mean, as Brighouse himself explains, "[T]hat while it is unobjectionable that state actions will have differential effects on conceptions of the good, the government should not intend to favor some conceptions over others" (NPS, 38, emphasis mine). The publicity constraint can be characterized by saying that in any just, liberal regime, justice must not only be done, but it must also be seen as being done. While this serves as the motto of the publicity constraint, it is significant to acknowledge that it stipulates that the real reasons for governmental action must be comprehensible to, and available for inspection by, reasonable citizens. In addition, it must be readily apparent to citizens that the demands of justice are being met. I will return to this constraint on the state later in this essay.Neutrality is of chief interest, since recent liberal political philosophers have emphasized the primacy of the right over the good (RLD, 245). Presumably, individuals, via their rational autonomy, shall define the good for themselves beyond the dictates of government. Our morality is our own personal affair, just so long as we remain within the confines of the harm principle and do not violate the equal liberty of others.On the surface, it is not apparent that state funding for the... (shrink)

Modern, science-centered naturalisms can be charged with a certain moral laxity, according to S. T. Coleridge. This fault reflectsnbsp; a devitalizing, materialistic metaphysics informed by a narrow and self-serving conception of reason. Thus seeking a remedy that can bring justice to the spiritual as well as the physical aspects of experience, Coleridge envisages a lsquo;true naturalismrsquo; that will not only address the question lsquo;What is Life?rsquo; but also frame a lsquo;true realismrsquo; that includes what might be called a lsquo;true moralismrsquo;. (...) This calls, however, for a Heraclitean metaphysics capable of linking lsquo;goodnessrsquo; in both thinking and acting to a *Logos*mdash;that is, an essentially nonmodern theory of actuality that can do justice at once to the quicknesses and the uniformities of both Life and Thought. Coleridgersquo;s thus presents an outline of how one might respond to a challenge that can be best met, I argue, with the help of certain insights of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, A. N. Whitehead, Gilles Deleuze, and C. S. Peirce. By enlisting Hannah Arendtrsquo;s individual-centered conception of morality, which ties ethics to public concerns, it is also possible to sketch a metaphysically grounded response to Friedrich Nietzschersquo;s call for a lsquo;healthy moralityrsquo; capable of overturning the nihilistic values entrenched in modern thought. br /. (shrink)

Thesis file is unavailable. Decisions are performatives - or at least, they share important features with performative utterances that can elucidate our theory of what type of thought they are, and what they do. Namely, decisions have an analogous force to that of performatives, where the force of a propositional attitude or utterance is constituted by (i) its point, or purpose, which is mainly a matter of its direction-of-fit, and (ii) its felicity conditions. The force of both decisions and performatives (...) is to bring into being the states of affairs represented in their intentional contents, merely in virtue of the decision or performative’s occurrence and the satisfaction of the felicity conditions they presuppose. The first chapter of the thesis explicates this general framework, and the second and third attempt to show some of the work it can do for a theory of decisions. (shrink)

During the spring of 1983 I began my third semester in college giving serious consideration to the thought of becoming a philosophy major. I had taken a few courses and found the subject intriguing. More influential in my own considerations was the fact that I had recently converted to Christianity and had been encouraged by some early mentors in the faith to read the works of various Christian philosophers both contemporary and classical. One evening that semester I was studying for (...) an upcoming exam when a friend, “John,” came to the door. From the look on his face I knew he was after something, what I wasn’t sure. I had known John since arriving at college, having met him at the Christian Fellowship meetings on campus. John had grown up in a devoutly Christian home and had cultivated a deep love for and devotion to his faith. However, he had struggled academically and was especially troubled by the fact that his faith seemed to have little amicable contact with the view of the world set forth by his admittedly unsympathetic professors. John began telling me about his professor for his introductory philosophy class who was, in his estimation, “leaning on” the theists in the class. He felt that every move in the course was calculated to reinforce the confidence of the atheist at the theist’s expense. At the end of the most recent lecture the professor punctuated the class as he had each semester, by offering a challenge to his students: “If you can find anyone who is willing to come to offer a philosophical defense of theism,” he mocked, “I will give them an entire class to do so.” Upon hearing the quote, I feared John was going to ask just what he proceeded to ask: “Would you try it.” Not surprisingly, I thought it unwise for someone with the full experience of one semester of philosophy under his belt to challenge a professor of nearly twenty years. Not to mention the fact that the one I would have to confront would likely be determining my future academic fate as one of my major professors.. (shrink)

_T__he Possibility of Culture: Pleasure and Moral Development in Kant’s Aesthetics_ presents an in-depth exploration and deconstruction of Kant’s depiction of the ways in which aesthetic pursuits can promote personal moral development. Presents an in-depth exploration of the connection between Kant’s aesthetics and his views on moral development Reveals the links between Kant’s aesthetics and his anthropology and moral psychology Explores Kant’s notion of genius and his views on the connections between the social aspects of taste and moral development Addresses (...) aspects of Kant’s ethical theory that will interest scholars working in ethics and moral psychology. (shrink)

This is a rough translation of Michael Frede's "La théorie aristotélicienne de l'intellect agent" published in 1996. This insightful paper contains an important interpretation of Aristotle's notoriously difficult theory of the active intellect from De Anima III, 5. I worked up a translation during some research and thought others might benefit from having an English translation available (I couldn't find one after a cursory internet search). It's not perfect, but it should give one a sense for Frede's argument that the (...) agent intellect is the same as the divine intellect of Metaphysics Lambda. I welcome any comments or suggestions for improvement, please email me at smurray7 [at] providence [dot] edu. (shrink)

This edited volume illustrates the central importance of diversity of human values throughout healthcare. The readings are organised around the main stages of the clinical encounter from the patient's perspective. This introductory chapter opens up crucial issues of methodology and of practical application in this highly innovative approach to the role of ethics in healthcare.

This volume of articles, literature and case studies illustrates the central importance of human values throughout healthcare. The readings are structured around the main stages of the clinical encounter from the patient's perspective.

This paper argues that professionals who make boundary-related decisions should be guided by relationship-based practice. In our roles as service users and professionals, drawing from our lived experiences of professional relationships, we argue we need to move away from distance-based practice. This includes understanding the boundary stories and narratives that exist for all of us – including the people we support, other professionals, as well as the organisations and systems within which we work. When we are dealing with professional boundary (...) issues, we should centre relationship-building skills that are central to many other aspects of our work. Skills that foster relationships at all levels – between professionals, service users, and services – need to be revalued. Our final recommendation is to create, develop, and foster safer spaces within and outside of organisations, as well as inter-professionally, for the discussion and exploration of boundary-related issues and practice. We are interested in hearing from those with experiences of being marginalised by boundaries so that they can inform a reshaping of our collective ideas around boundary related practices. To foster relationship-based practices in organisations, we have outlined several recommendations here; however, we recognize that these do not go far enough, and that collective action is needed to inform systemic change. (shrink)

In recent work, Peter Hanks and Scott Soames argue that propositions are types whose tokens are acts, states, or events. Let’s call this view the type view. Hanks and Soames think that one of the virtues of the type view is that it allows them to explain why propositions have semantic properties. But, in this paper, we argue that their explanations aren’t satisfactory. In Section 2, we present the type view. In Section 3, we present one explanation—due to Hanks (2007, (...) 2011) and Soames (2010)—of why propositions have semantic properties. We criticize this first explanation in Section 4. In Section 5, we present another explanation—due to Soames (2104)—of why propositions have semantic properties. We criticize this second explanation in Section 6. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Drawing inspiration from Fred Dretske, L. S. Carrier, John A. Barker, and Robert Nozick, we develop a tracking analysis of knowing according to which a true belief constitutes knowledge if and only if it is based on reasons that are sensitive to the fact that makes it true, that is, reasons that wouldn’t obtain if the belief weren’t true. We show that our sensitivity analysis handles numerous Gettier-type cases and lottery problems, blocks pathways leading to skepticism, and validates the (...) epistemic closure thesis that correct inferences from known premises yield knowledge of the conclusions. We discuss the plausible views of Ted Warfield and Branden Fitelson regarding cases of knowledge acquired via inference from false premises, and we show how our sensitivity analysis can account for such cases. We present arguments designed to discredit putative counterexamples to sensitivity analyses recently proffered by Tristan Haze, John Williams and Neil Sinhababu, which involve true statements made by untrustworthy informants and strange clocks that sometimes display the correct time while running backwards. Finally, we show that in virtue of employing the paradox-free subjunctive conditionals codified by Relevance Logic theorists instead of the paradox-laden subjunctive conditionals codified by Robert Stalnaker and David Lewis. (shrink)

A new edition of a work first published in 1926, in which Fr. Summers recounts the nature and the historical activities of the witch, "devotee of a loathly and obscene creed." One cannot doubt either the author's sincerity or his scholarship, evidenced by thorough documentation and a bibliography of 30 pages. A Forword by Felix Morrow compares the author's position with the more skeptical views of M. A. Murray.--E. T.

Mr. Agar has collected his adversaria on the Odyssey which have been enjoying cold storage these many years in the blue depths of the Journal of Philology, and increased them by about three-quarters. He has produced a very interesting and valuable book, the most important contribution to the linguistic history of the Homeric text that has been made for a long time. Mr. Agar holds that the language of Homer represents the original ‘Achaean’ speech, and that its abnormalities in vocabulary, (...) word-formation and metre are the result of natural unforced processes of transmission. This position, held by so well equipped and so trenchant an investigator as Mr. Agar, is reassuring. It does not involve any of the mythological factors of the Higher or the Lower Criticism still recommended among us by Mr. Leaf, Father Browne and Mr. Verrall–Pisistratus, Onomacritus, the Ionian conquest of Smyrna, the Thessalian Iliad, the original Achilleis,–and disagrees with Professor Murray's sinister diagnosis clear away the Attic surface and there rises beneath another surface with another set of corruptions, where Ionic rhapsodes have introduced just the same elements of confusion into an Aeolic or at least a pre-Ionic language. The confusion of tongues is deep down in the heart of the Homeric, dialect, and no surgery in the world can cut beneath it’ . The last ten years’ work in Comparative Philology has made it clearer and clearer that the rule-of-thumb for distinguishing the historical non-Dorian dialects does not apply to the heroic and post-heroic age, and that the terms ‘Aeolic’ and ‘Ionic’ in their usual sense should disappear from the history of Homer. The Homeric tongue derives directly from the pre-colonial language of Greece wherein two elements are discernible, the original Ionian and the Achaean or North-Greek which overlaid it. (shrink)

Roderick T. Long reviews Total Freedom: Toward a Dialectical Libertarianism, the long-awaited final volume of Chris Sciabarra's "Dialectics and Liberty" trilogy. Long finds Total Freedom to be an impressive scholarly achievement that makes a compelling case for the existence of, and the need to further promote, affinities between the seemingly disparate intellectual traditions of libertarianism and dialectics. However, Long argues that Sciabarra's neglect of certain crucial distinctions vitiates to some extent his case for dialectics, his critique of Murray Rothbard's (...) anarchism, and his application of the Objectivist theory of abstraction to the problem of internal relations. (shrink)

A lot of people owe kind words to Tom Murray. Not because they hurt his feelings, or because he is easily the nicest guy in bioethics. The debt stems from the palpable silence that accompanied the release of Murray's trenchant and beautiful book, TheWorthofaChild. Somehow, in the shuffle to write and rewrite books about cloning and octuplets and $50,000 eggs, Murray's astonishingly comprehensive treatment of the meaning of the parent–child relationship passed undetected across the radar screens of (...) virtually everyone who writes about reproduction and genetics. In the year since I read TheWorthofaChild, I have paused dozens of times while reading or listening to scholars lament the dearth of careful work on the changing nature of baby-making. Each time this happens I grow more surprised that Murray's Child, which is handsomely bound, well-indexed, and published in the best style by University of California Press, isn't mentioned. This review is one scholar's attempt to right the balance. TheWorthofaChild by Thomas Murray is the most rigorous, most even-handed, and most comprehensive book ever written about the ethical issues associated with making a baby. It is also a very good read, a sensitive and moving portrayal of the struggle to be good at making and raising a child. (shrink)